Well.ca, Canada’s favorite online drugstore, has just landed what is the largest investment the Maple Leaf Angels have made to date. Angels participating in the round include: Colin Webster, former CEO of Truition a JLA Ventures backed company and Jim Estill, a Research In Motion board member and CEO of Synnex. Well.ca has come a long way in just one year.

I first met Ali Asaria, Well.ca’s Founder & CEO, at last year’s Mesh Conference. Ali was at the time equipped with a less memorable domain (CanadaHomeHealth.ca), a plan (Well.ca), and TONS of enthusiasm. Our conversation touched on financing a startup and Ali cheerfully admitted he hadn’t a clue how to do it… yet.

What they have created in one year is a sight to behold. The company is running smoothly, sales are growing briskly, and the first angel financing is secured. Well.ca has over 10,000 registered customers, ships thousands of products per month, and is seeing 35% growth month over month. Why do customers keep coming back? Just in time delivery of over 10,000 products sure helps, but I am convinced it is Well.ca’s cheerful attitude and super customer friendly service.

In our first days of operation, we literally hand-filled-out postage labels to ship to our customers, and, carrying towers of boxes, I walked them over to the local post office. It’s exactly one year later — the mesh conference is about to take place again, and we’ve grown from 2 employees to what will be 9 by the end of this month. We no longer hand-write postage labels, but we still write hand-written notes to thank every one of the thousands of new customers that have bought from our site.

Jevon and I are brimming with pride. The angel financing marks a rite of passage for Ali as an entrepreneur and for Well.ca as a company. And we can hardly wait to keep on celebrating their many future successes. Ask Ali what the best part of the adventure has been and I guarantee he’ll have this to say: “The greatest part is the group of people we have working here.” Here’s a team that is doing well and having fun:


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